


Trust is Just a Five Letter Word

by Christer_Bleu



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Non-Human Character, Non-Linear Narrative, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Non-binary character, Other, Shapeshifting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-06-04 10:41:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 7,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6654781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Christer_Bleu/pseuds/Christer_Bleu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aelle had not heard the voice of the great spirit that was the Skaikru, the skaikeyon’s voice was not theirs to hear but the message was clear enough. South and still further south they had travelled to devote their life to the skaipraisa who bore Wanheda and take one of the many faces of death into themself. They had returned home feeling as if something profound had changed though it clearly had not, that face of death had lay with its eyes closed for seasons before its eyes had opened.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone who does care you can keep track of what I'm doing with the pseudonyms you can check out the entirety of team [CVRN](https://teamcvrn.wordpress.com/)
> 
> If anyone has a prompt, question, comment or concern you contact [Team CVRN](mailto:teamcvrn@yahoo.com).  
> .

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It had not so far but there was still time yet before they would be expected to return south and their eyes were keen, their ears sharp. Much that the Azgeda would not have the Kongeda know had been revealed to them.

A shadow among shadows within the shadows haunted the footsteps of the queen as she traversed slowly through the echoing corridors of her great hall. This game was reaching its inevitable conclusion, a game the queen had lost before it had ever truly begun. In these months the white queen had begun to hesitate, to weaken, to question herself as the uncaring hand of death fell across her kingdom. It haunted her mind, poisoned the crops, sickened the people, and stole the breathe from the very lungs of her mate. This last was a true tragedy, the plague that had fallen upon these lands had taken much and more from its people and to remove the balance of the blade that was the queen would only invite disaster in the near future. The raids had only stopped when the queen’s mate had fallen pregnant and with the life of the child now in danger from the very same illness that had taken his mother away from this world, the queen’s sanity being called into question wasn’t unheard of.

Perhaps the queen would be forced to step down, perhaps she would be sacrificed to appease the gods that had so betrayed the Azgeda, perhaps the queen would be made to prostrate herself before the skaipraisa and beg forgiveness.

There were many outcomes and most of them were carefully hidden behind the fog of the other world, the spirits showed only what they wished and only allowed their speakers to say so much on any given matter. But the wings of the skaikeyon had spread and all the lands that fell into its shadow would fall into ruin. These were things that they knew that the queen didn’t, things the queen didn’t believe in were drawing nearer and nearer, stirred from their home in that other place by unknown forces.

But the skaikeyon had come to them in a dream years ago and they had dreamed of it again, every night since travelling north. A mighty beast with wings of black flames and eyes of cold starlight, the shape of its body lost to their eyes. It was said that when the Skaikru had fallen from the heavens a tongue of flames like the ones that had destroyed the old world had painted the sky, a light as bright as the sun illuminating their mountain, a pillar of black smoke lingering for days heralding the arrival of Wanheda into this world. That Great Spirit had wandered for generations, more than any cared to count until it was believed to be nothing more than a myth.

It was no wonder that Wanheda had seen fit to burn the Mountain Men with a flame that had touched only those vile creatures. That had been the first night that they had dreamed of the skaikeyon and in the roiling black of its body it had shown them Wanheda, the new soul that the ancient one had attached itself too, and bid them seek this woman out. It had allowed them no rest until they had found her bathing in a river.

It was only fitting that Wanheda had chosen an omega, one who gave life so freely and willingly should be the one to steal that life away from others. That was just the nature of the world.

The wind howled, the biting cold had frozen the fur about her shoulders stiff, the blizzard quickly approaching driving even the most dedicated of the Azgeda’s guards and scouts indoors. To the roaring fires the gonas fled to coax warmth back into limbs that had gone numb with the bone shattering cold of the northlands. But they were not cold. They alone among Wanheda’s shadows were immune to the icy northlands, none of the shadows were so inclined to remain far from the quiet fires, they had not yet learned to find the core of their souls and the warmth therein, if they couldn’t find it they couldn’t spread it outward into their flesh.

But these gona who served beside them as Wanheda’s shadow were not born beneath the eye of their mountain, the souls of these gona not born of stone and cold and wind and ice, these gona had not had heart and mind shaped by the Moon Child. These gona were not as Aelle kom Ouska Ejon Kru, few Ouskejon were as they were. To peer into the world unseen was to change to the core of one’s being and it was only natural that the children of men would hesitate to do so. To hear the voices of the spirits of one’s people was to invite madness and to survive it one must embrace it.

Aelle had not heard the voice of the great spirit that was the Skaikru, the skaikeyon’s voice was not theirs to hear but the message was clear enough. South and still further south they had travelled to devote their life to the skaipraisa who bore Wanheda and take one of the many faces of death into themself. They had returned home feeling as if something profound had changed though it clearly had not, that face of death had lay with its eyes closed for seasons before its eyes had opened. 

Within days the riders had come with the message but Aelle had been waiting, waiting to confirm that they understood the mission that they were to undertake. To watch and see as the skaikeyon had spread its wings, to report what they had seen to Wanheda –and should opportunity present itself strike the head from the queen.

It had not so far but there was still time yet before they would be expected to return south and their eyes were keen, their ears sharp. Much that the Azgeda would not have the Kongeda now had been revealed to them.

Nia, Quin kom Azgeda had another son sired in her youth. To the Azgeda that made the boy less, illegitimate and therefore unable to ascend to power but he was strong. A fierce creature with the strength of the lean bears that graced the shield of the royal family and its loyal subjects but he had grown resentful. Denied the summer raids he had filled his time as a simple farmer, reminded of his lowly station at every turn by the gona of his village.

Deep inside the wildness stirred, pulled ever closer to the surface each time they reached down to the warmth in the center of themself. The warmth and fire belonged to the wildness and its natural shape, it was as much a part of them as their arms and legs but as far removed as the winds that buffeted the cliffs during the harvest. That shape was as true to them as the shape of a man but it belonged to the great spirit of their own people. A gift from those gona who had passed beyond the moon and returned to those who had earned the attention of the great spirit, new souls who had been selected to accomplish some task.

Soon they would pull the warmth so close they would be scalded by it, like standing too close to a bonfire and this shape would fall away for the other. In the darkness they licked their lips in anticipation, the time was nearing for them to enter the city again and this shape wouldn’t serve as well as the other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the land of false starts, the beginning of an idea spawned in the time spent awake between the end of my shift and the beginning of class. Add a thirty to forty minute commute home, shower, food and the time I would actually spend asleep before I had to get up and spend another forty minutes in traffic to get to class it’s better to just say awake and feel terrible than sleep and feel even worse. Like warmed over death. The original first chapter will be officially labelled as a false start and be taken down in favor of this.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From this great distance in the bitter cold they could smell him, smell his fear. “I know that you know that I am coming, and you are right to be afraid.”

When the bombs had fallen, when the previous world crumbled and the first world had unwound from the ashes humanity had changed as it must, as it was inclined too. The steel and iron and glass of the second world had been removed at large, the greatest of the artificial cities reduced to ruins like the broken teeth of giants haunted by the poisonous vengeance of that false world. long dormant lines re-emerged, ancient rites and rituals remembered but the gods of early man were gone. Their long slumber leaving them too weak to rouse and rule the world again, the old spirits destroyed and new spirits born to take their place. This world both new and bone achingly ancient was a world of spirits.

They had meant to enter the city, to skulk around like a shadow on the snow, just another of the surly hounds that wandered the city streets if larger, wilder, wicked and intelligent. Instead when the flames that engulfed their skin had settled, as their body twisted, as hair had melted to fur, that wildness in their mind driving them to the west away from the city. Away from the sea and salt and up into the hills and pines, the desperate sprint over snow and ice giving way to the relentless pace of the hunt they could sustain for what felt like an eternity.

Somewhere during the impossible distance they covered came others, clustered close to Aelle’s massive bulk beneath the sheltering branches of a half-dead paper birch. The snow was falling heavily, the storm rolling closer. Six adult wolves lay with them at the edge of the pack’s range, their company soothing as Aelle took great mouthfuls of snow to ease the great thirst that had arisen within them.

In those quiet moments before they continued on came the knowledge of this mission, that somewhere ahead in the dark stumbled a man marked for death. Further on, miles more and they’d find the man and tear his life from him to appease their mistress. From this great distance in the bitter cold they could smell him, smell his fear. “ _I know that you know that I am coming, and you are right to be afraid._ ” They rested for half a candle mark before they were up and moving again. Beneath their paws the country changed, the rolling hills giving way to the great hilly mountain chain, the scents changed. Somewhere to the northwest were Heda’s scouts, those who had found this man, and it was to the warriors clustered around their fire Aelle howled a long mournful sound of greeting and thanks. 

Ahead the man ran faster but he could not run fast enough. His weight crashing through the snow as they glided effortlessly on top of it. Their throat was dry, the thirst returning but snow would not quench it this time. The scent of his fear on the wind, the sound of his infantile struggling slower and closer still until they broke into a clearing – to the east the sky was lightening. This hunt was over and the man knew it, they watched scramble ungracefully into a withered pine bent low to the ground beneath the snow. As if they weren’t also a man, as if they couldn’t climb as well, as if him climbing a tree would _save_ him from his death.

Circling around the base of the tree the mask of death, the face that Wanheda had branded deep into their soul opened its eyes. Eyes the color of the cloudless autumnal skies of the Floukru lands, the sclera black, the guileless blue ringed thickly with the color of blood. Coiled tightly on their haunches, hackles rising with the blood lust, tail down, they leapt up into the tree after the man mouth agape.

Their leap brought them just short of the man’s perch but it was close enough, foolishly the man had held out his arm some talisman clutched tightly in his fingers. Twisting away from the wooden thing they closed their jaws on the man’s elbow, felt the bones crunch beneath the unbearable pressure brought to bear. Wrenching their head to the side Aelle severed his arm above the elbow, the man’s shriek one of agony and surprise as he tumbled ungracefully to the ground.

Something inside of him had broken as he landed wrong, more blood staining the snow almost black, the faint ivory gleam of bone protruding from beneath his skin but the pain didn’t last long. The man was old and frail, exhausted and withered from his flight through the mountains and Aelle was strong, invigorated by the hunt. With the man on the ground it was easy, a simple matter of going about a task ingrained in their bones. Who the man was they didn’t know, couldn’t know until the eyes of the face of death had closed and the blood lust had eased.

With passionate disinterest they gazed down at what had been a man now reduced to ruin on the snow, the head severed beneath the neck. With no hands they were left with no choice but to seize the glistening chain of spine now exposed attached to the head. Turning slowly to the south they looked to the lightening sky, painted grey with the coming storm, as the last of night was chased away there, for an instant, was the shadow of the skaikeyon.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the past things were different, the world was fresh and promising.

They ran.

Out before them the land changed, the endurance they displayed remarkable, the energy fueling their muscles boundlessly. Flying over the earth, gliding through the forests like a whisper of wind.

They ran because they must.

This world was strange to them now, as strange as it must have been when they first entered it but queerer still. They knew this world, knew these woods and cliffs as well as any hunter – better for they were the Moon Child’s seken. Since they could toddle after the Moon Child they had wandered this forest, learned the plants and their properties.

They ran because they could.

They had known of this form, known as long as they had memory that somewhere within them was something wild. This impossible thing had smelled like the sweet musk of fur, rich black earth and rain. Deep inside it had rested, waiting until they were strong enough to claim that form, to bring it into reality.

They ran endlessly.

There was an impossible strength in their muscles, endless endurance in their body. They could run forever, they would run to the place where the sky would embrace the earth.

They ran to a place they did not know.

What had driven them from the comfort of their bed days ago, one moment they had been asleep dreaming of soaring high over the peaks fo their mountains. They were an eagle in the dream, the Moon Child’s eagle had pulled them with her into the heavens until there had been something glowing to the south. Before they had fully awakened they were running, running to –

Where?

Abruptly the land dropped beneath their paws, ungracefully they tumbled in a skitter of stones and pine needles down a sharp embankment into a river. Claws scrambling on sandy earth, unable to find purchase they crashed into the icy cold water with a startled yelp. Resurfacing with a barking cough Aelle felt the compulsion to run lift.

Here.

They smelled her before they saw her, sunlight on cloves and rain on the sweet grasses in the meadows to the southeast of their village. There, on the far bank, was a woman with eyes like a cloudless sky and hair like spun white gold.

 _Here_.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who might only know peace in death.

“Are you a man or a beast, Alle kom Ouskaejon?” a curious question for a curious woman to ask though she knew the answer, the same blood ran through her veins as well, though she was a cat and they a wolf.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next, that she **had** to die._

Perhaps she was seeking vindication, a kindred spirit giving into the beast within at the slightest provocation and losing herself entirely to the animal for weeks at a time. Perhaps she thought that they were the same, feral beasts alike, without control and thirsting for blood and not wanting to be in control. It was a possibility, a vision of what they would be if they were born beneath the hell of the Azgeda, chained in the shape of their beast for months possibly years at a time. Treated as an animal a man would become an animal, a beast to be unleashed upon the enemies of the Azgeda at the behest of the Azplana.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next, that her fate was a sad as the life she had lived._

“Which do you believe I am?” perception is a strange powerful thing, what she saw them as was what she believed them to be. What did she need them to be in these final moments.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next. She would die this night, why not squeeze some final enjoyment into her life?_

If the Azplana thought no one would see through this power play was anyone’s guess, their ability was not well known in the east and the secret so closely guarded that none of Heda’s most successful spies could even begin to guess if the skinwalkers were a myth, if the skinwalkers were men who became animals or animals who became men, if a skinwalker had been born this generation. In truth only Wanheda knew, no secrets could be kept from death or she who commanded death and death kept its secrets close.

_Tonight they would do an evil thing._

The cruel smile on the Azgeda Skinwalker’s face opened a wound on their heart, they mourned the death of their kindred, they mourned the death of this potential to produce yet another skinwalker. When she died the likelihood of them producing a pup decreased dramatically, all they could now hope for was that one of the returning spirits would bear the spirit of an animal should they have a child.

_They mourned the death of the Azgeda Skinwalker._

They unchained the wolf in their soul.

_They mourned the death of the Azgeda Skinwalker._

The fight was brief, vicious and silent as these things were meant to be, as her instincts demanded that they be. She was strong and wily but they were iron, the face of death opening in their belly spilling liquid fire into their veins. Liquid fire in their muscles.

Stronger than the Azgeda Skinwalker.

_Freer than the Azgeda Skinwalker._

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker._

Even as they mounted her pale body, enjoying not the act of sex but what would come after. The ecstasy of release that was came with a completed task, the recourse that the face within gave them to keep them enthralled. Even as their strength grew, the force of their bodies coming together increased, they mourned.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who had never been free._

.

Even as the face of death began to open its eyes slowly like a child roused so soon after they had fallen asleep, that force agreeing with that last thought that was wholly their own – to ease her passage from this life into the next. A final pleasure and shock to ease her souls passage from this form into the next. Hopefully her next life would be easier, kinder, and merciful enough that she would remember this life.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who had never known kindness or mercy._

Even as she reached completion. Even as they seized her about the throat, digging fingers into the thick veins on either side as they cut off her air. Within seconds she was unconscious, that final ecstasy heightened by the lack of blood and air; the knife driven into her back puncturing her heart and lungs took her life.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who might only know peace in death._

Even as they were granted some solace, the face inside was singing softly, glowing faintly. It was a song they knew, the song of the Trishana.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Skaikru focused on the minutest of details of the human body in a way unique onto them discounting much of the keyon, no matter how grievous the injury a keyon of exceptional strength could over come any injury, the body would live on though truly broken.

“Those who are best suited to lead are those who do not wish too, those who do not seek power deserve it.” Their time among the Skaikru had been short but educational, little was known about the Skaikru’s culture but they were known to be strange even among the Kongeda.

That coming from a gona of the Ouska Ejon Kru who possessed the spirit of a beast, who actively slipped human skin for the pelt of a mighty hunter, said much. That they were born to a people known to hide as hounds in villages to learn, to watch, to wait to commune with the spirits of the other kru of the Kongeda in the stories of wives and elderly women. Few of these women knew the truth, that there _were_ skinwalkers among the Ouska Ejon Kru and the Trishana.

Curled up beside the feet of the woman who had called them from their bed weeks ago the world tended to ignore Aelle. The spectacle of their arrival had been passed over, strange things happened around this woman, Clarke, and their appearance had been passed over.

They lay with their head on their paws dozing lazily in the afternoon sun as Clarke attended a lesson on herbs in the garden of the skaifisa. The techniques involved were far more advanced than their own rudimentary lessons meant to give a gona time to get to a fisa, one who had trained in the art since the days before they had begun the transition from childhood to adulthood. The Skaikru focused on the minutest of details of the human body in a way unique onto them discounting much of the keyon, no matter how grievous the injury a keyon of exceptional strength could over come any injury, the body would live on though truly broken.

Which was better, they could not say.

On occasion Clarke would reach down and give them a scratch between the ears, reassurance they had not been forgotten. There was no doubt in Aelle that Clarke knew that Aelle was no wolf, no hound, but something more and Aelle knew that Clarke knew and would hold her silence. They had spoken only in her dreams, dreams shared by their kindred keyon – the great eagles that had once stood on the banners of the country that had existed here before the old world ended. They whined affectionately as she scratched at the sensitive place, lifting their head to lick at her hand as she pulled away. 

A shift in the wind.

A change sensed by not yet seen.

Determining the sensitivity of Clarke to the spirit world would require a great effort and time that neither potentially had. Before Clarke could pull completely away they moved, large jaws closing gently over her retreating hand, capturing it as gently as they could, careful of their teeth. A low growl built in their chest, a seemingly unnecessary alarm in=f the look in blue eyes way anything to go on. She could sense it to.

Somewhere, somewhere close was death and fate and Clarke seemed to know it which was good, she would make the ultimate decision as to what they would do next, which was exceptional. The day’s lesson ended then, the skaifisa knowing Clarke too well to continue when his apprentice’s mind was elsewhere but the task on hand.

 _“Be wary.”_ jagged nails down their spine, the growl becoming a snarl. _“The death of your Mistress draws near.”_ ice in their veins and mind, an aching pain in their bones as the Skaikeyon spoke to them.

The horns of the village sentries sounded.

Their snarl growing into a howl.

Trice.

_”The death of your Mistress draws near, her first death but not her final death”._

Heda approaching.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> My father is a wolf

The souls of the north were sympathetic, the people of the Kongeda divided not by cultural or religious means but by geography and the spirits that sprung from it. They were a harsh people, as harsh as their lands and as harsh as their spirits, the Azgeda and the Ouska Ejon Kru shared spirits though the same could be said for the Azgeda and Trikru, Azgeda and Floukru, the whole of the Kongeda and the whole of the Kongeda save the Skaikru but that was changing.

_My father is a wolf._

At first, she thought, perhaps, the statement was meant to be poetic. The relationship between the Azgeda and Ouska Ejon Kru was no secret, it had never been a secret, but Aelle was not one to use such poetic language. Having been given up to the Moon Child almost at birth, Aelle had known only the Moon Child as both mother and father, the statement had to be literal. What little she knew of Aelle was enough evidence that the statement might be the absolute truth.

Each of the clans of the Kongeda were possessed of a different sympathetic soul, so in tune with the spirits released by the fall of the old cities of metal an glass. The gods of the old world had fallen and man had once again turned back to nature, their new gods created as these sympathetic souls found one another. The power of these spirits were strange, imbuing their people with their strange abilities and one of the strangest and rarest of those abilities Aelle possessed.

Skin changers, shapeshifters, all but legend the further east and south you went.

For all the legends and myth that surrounded the skin changers Aelle proved that most were true and admitted the gift was exceedingly rare. For every hundred night bloods born there was perhaps a single skin walker born and few lived beyond childhood, one a generation was not to be expected. Among the more western kru the child was always given up to the Moon Child regardless of what kru they had been born into.

_My father is a wolf._

But Aelle was a wolf and a man though she had never seen Aelle’s face, only heard their voice that night as she lay abed. The shape of the shadow was lithe and graceful, slender in the way of the Ouska Ejon Kru betraying their heritage in the way same that their accent did. But that shape was clearly that of a man.

Is that why Aelle’s other form was a wolf?

Because Aelle’s father was a wolf.

Either way she had decided upon Aelle kom Ouska Ejon Kru though for what she was not entirely sure. There were many things she had done that she was not certain of , the exact whys lost in the trance of the Skaikeyon.

But she was certain that she could rely upon Aelle.

After all, Aelle was only the first she would call to her. The first that had answered.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was for the best, Wanheda would out live them all.

It was not hard to play the part of the loyal hound, Wanheda was known to possess a number of queer abilities surrounded by death at every turn. The gona shied away from them, various signs meant to ward away either evil or death displayed everywhere they walked. But none dared bar their way, the favored pet of Wanheda obedient at her side at each summit. Absently they gnawed at the bloody hunk of cow presented to them ears and nose scanning the halls as the visiting delegation mingling senselessly.

The posturing long and boring, the alliances were long set and their agenda clear to anyone who cared to pay attention.

Discretely their mistress passed along small portions of whatever passed the high table for inspection. A man’s senses could not detect the scent of treachery, poison was an inelegant tool that anyone could use without the slightest care for the art. That anyone could believe something as simple as poison could undo Wanheda was distantly amusing, unfortunately her chosen mate was not so resistant to death.

The legitimate heir of the Kongeda was a mighty warrior but Heda had yet to take the Mountain, the legitimacy of Heda’s reign had been in question until just recently. Arguably Heda’s only smart move was taking Wanheda for mate but even then, since the razing of the army, Wanheda had not performed another “miracle”.

There was a shift in the room.

Good, they had begun to take note of the missing man, Heda’s faithful servant and the pawn of yet another conspiracy. That Wanheda had once drunk poison and lived though her brave poisoner, the martyr, had fallen to convulsions only moments after the toast. That Wanheda had survived another assassination attempt was no surprise but the fleimkappa was not here, he who had facilitated attempt the fleimkappa’s head was mounted on a pike in the throne room.

Another face moved through the crowd, meticulously searching, seeking to uncover the whole of the conspiracy. Alysane Silvertongue was a useful asset, her genuine feelings of discontent with the Kongeda and open resistance to Heda at every turn made her an unlikely ally to Wanheda. All of Wanheda’s Forces had been chosen long before her departure from the reclusive Skaikru, her personal history unknown to even her chosen mate.

It was for the best, Wanheda would out live them all.

As the young woman draw closer they cracked one of the many bones in the nearly twenty pounds of meat they’d been provided between the thick bone crunching teeth far back in their jaws as loudly as possible. A deep rumbling growl of amusement echoed I the thick barrel of their chest rose as Heda flinched, her made did not. As Wanheda’s faithful hound it was their duty to inform her whenever a potential threat drew near, startling Heda was just a joy on top of the duty which they performed with a near religious vigor.

As a pale hand descended to scratch as the base of their ears, they whined in pleasure raising their head to chase her hand. “Where is Titos?” the hall went quiet even as Wanheda continued to stroke their head The man’s head was displayed to any and all who cared to browse the heads lined neatly up in the throne room but this coonformtation must happen for the sake of undoing the conspiracy. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _They mourned the death of the Azgeda Skinwalker._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

“Are you a man or a beast, Alle kom Ouskaejon?” a curious question for a curious woman to ask though she knew the answer, the same blood ran through her veins as well, though she was a cat and they a wolf.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next, that she **had** to die._

Perhaps she was seeking vindication, a kindred spirit giving into the beast within at the slightest provocation and losing herself entirely to the animal for weeks at a time. Perhaps she thought that they were the same, feral beasts alike, without control and thirsting for blood and not wanting to be in control. It was a possibility, a vision of what they would be if they were born beneath the hell of the Azgeda, chained in the shape of their beast for months possibly years at a time. Treated as an animal a man would become an animal, a beast to be unleashed upon the enemies of the Azgeda at the behest of the Azplana.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next, that her fate was a sad as the life she had lived._

“Which do you believe I am?” perception is a strange powerful thing, what she saw them as was what she believed them to be. What did she need them to be in these final moments.

_They mourned what would inevitably come next. She would die this night, why not squeeze some final enjoyment into her life?_

If the Azplana thought no one would see through this power play was anyone’s guess, their ability was not well known in the east and the secret so closely guarded that none of Heda’s most successful spies could even begin to guess if the skinwalkers were a myth, if the skinwalkers were men who became animals or animals who became men, if a skinwalker had been born this generation. In truth only Wanheda knew, no secrets could be kept from death or she who commanded death and death kept its secrets close.

_Tonight they would do an evil thing._

The cruel smile on the Azgeda Skinwalker’s face opened a wound on their heart, they mourned the death of their kindred, they mourned the death of this potential to produce yet another skinwalker. When she died the likelihood of them producing a pup decreased dramatically, all they could now hope for was that one of the returning spirits would bear the spirit of an animal should they have a child.

_They mourned the death of the Azgeda Skinwalker._

They unchained the wolf in their soul.

_They mourned the death of the Azgeda Skinwalker._

The fight was brief, vicious and silent as these things were meant to be, as her instincts demanded that they be. She was strong and wily but they were iron, the face of death opening in their belly spilling liquid fire into their veins. Liquid fire in their muscles.

Stronger than the Azgeda Skinwalker.

_Freer than the Azgeda Skinwalker._

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker._

Even as they mounted her pale body, enjoying not the act of sex but what would come after. The ecstasy of release that was came with a completed task, the recourse that the face within gave them to keep them enthralled. Even as their strength grew, the force of their bodies coming together increased, they mourned.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who had never been free._

.

Even as the face of death began to open its eyes slowly like a child roused so soon after they had fallen asleep, that force agreeing with that last thought that was wholly their own – to ease her passage from this life into the next. A final pleasure and shock to ease her souls passage from this form into the next. Hopefully her next life would be easier, kinder, and merciful enough that she would remember this life.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who had never known kindness or mercy._

Even as she reached completion. Even as they seized her about the throat, digging fingers into the thick veins on either side as they cut off her air. Within seconds she was unconscious, that final ecstasy heightened by the lack of blood and air; the knife driven into her back puncturing her heart and lungs took her life.

_They mourned the Azgeda Skinwalker, she who might only know peace in death._

Even as they were granted some solace, the face inside was singing softly, glowing faintly. It was a song they knew, the song of the Trishana.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _”The death of your Mistress draws near, her first death but not her final death”._

“Those who are best suited to lead are those who do not wish too, those who do not seek power deserve it.” Their time among the Skaikru had been short but educational, little was known about the Skaikru’s culture but they were known to be strange even among the Kongeda.

That coming from a gona of the Ouska Ejon Kru who possessed the spirit of a beast, who actively slipped human skin for the pelt of a mighty hunter, said much. That they were born to a people known to hide as hounds in villages to learn, to watch, to wait to commune with the spirits of the other kru of the Kongeda in the stories of wives and elderly women. Few of these women knew the truth, that there _were_ skinwalkers among the Ouska Ejon Kru and the Trishana.

Curled up beside the feet of the woman who had called them from their bed weeks ago the world tended to ignore Aelle. The spectacle of their arrival had been passed over, strange things happened around this woman, Clarke, and their appearance had been passed over.

They lay with their head on their paws dozing lazily in the afternoon sun as Clarke attended a lesson on herbs in the garden of the skaifisa. The techniques involved were far more advanced than their own rudimentary lessons meant to give a gona time to get to a fisa, one who had trained in the art since the days before they had begun the transition from childhood to adulthood. The Skaikru focused on the minutest of details of the human body in a way unique onto them discounting much of the keyon, no matter how grievous the injury a keyon of exceptional strength could over come any injury, the body would live on though truly broken.

Which was better, they could not say.

On occasion Clarke would reach down and give them a scratch between the ears, reassurance they had not been forgotten. There was no doubt in Aelle that Clarke knew that Aelle was no wolf, no hound, but something more and Aelle knew that Clarke knew and would hold her silence. They had spoken only in her dreams, dreams shared by their kindred keyon – the great eagles that had once stood on the banners of the country that had existed here before the old world ended. They whined affectionately as she scratched at the sensitive place, lifting their head to lick at her hand as she pulled away. 

A shift in the wind.

A change sensed by not yet seen.

Determining the sensitivity of Clarke to the spirit world would require a great effort and time that neither potentially had. Before Clarke could pull completely away they moved, large jaws closing gently over her retreating hand, capturing it as gently as they could, careful of their teeth. A low growl built in their chest, a seemingly unnecessary alarm in=f the look in blue eyes way anything to go on. She could sense it to.

Somewhere, somewhere close was death and fate and Clarke seemed to know it which was good, she would make the ultimate decision as to what they would do next, which was exceptional. The day’s lesson ended then, the skaifisa knowing Clarke too well to continue when his apprentice’s mind was elsewhere but the task on hand.

 _“Be wary.”_ jagged nails down their spine, the growl becoming a snarl. _“The death of your Mistress draws near.”_ ice in their veins and mind, an aching pain in their bones as the Skaikeyon spoke to them.

The horns of the village sentries sounded.

Their snarl growing into a howl.

Trice.

_”The death of your Mistress draws near, her first death but not her final death”._

Heda approaching.

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _My father is a wolf._

The souls of the north were sympathetic, the people of the Kongeda divided not by cultural or religious means but by geography and the spirits that sprung from it. They were a harsh people, as harsh as their lands and as harsh as their spirits, the Azgeda and the Ouska Ejon Kru shared spirits though the same could be said for the Azgeda and Trikru, Azgeda and Floukru, the whole of the Kongeda and the whole of the Kongeda save the Skaikru but that was changing.

_My father is a wolf._

At first, she thought, perhaps, the statement was meant to be poetic. The relationship between the Azgeda and Ouska Ejon Kru was no secret, it had never been a secret, but Aelle was not one to use such poetic language. Having been given up to the Moon Child almost at birth, Aelle had known only the Moon Child as both mother and father, the statement had to be literal. What little she knew of Aelle was enough evidence that the statement might be the absolute truth.

Each of the clans of the Kongeda were possessed of a different sympathetic soul, so in tune with the spirits released by the fall of the old cities of metal an glass. The gods of the old world had fallen and man had once again turned back to nature, their new gods created as these sympathetic souls found one another. The power of these spirits were strange, imbuing their people with their strange abilities and one of the strangest and rarest of those abilities Aelle possessed.

Skin changers, shapeshifters, all but legend the further east and south you went.

For all the legends and myth that surrounded the skin changers Aelle proved that most were true and admitted the gift was exceedingly rare. For every hundred night bloods born there was perhaps a single skin walker born and few lived beyond childhood, one a generation was not to be expected. Among the more western kru the child was always given up to the Moon Child regardless of what kru they had been born into.

_My father is a wolf._

But Aelle was a wolf and a man though she had never seen Aelle’s face, only heard their voice that night as she lay abed. The shape of the shadow was lithe and graceful, slender in the way of the Ouska Ejon Kru betraying their heritage in the way same that their accent did. But that shape was clearly that of a man.

Is that why Aelle’s other form was a wolf?

Because Aelle’s father was a wolf.

Either way she had decided upon Aelle kom Ouska Ejon Kru though for what she was not entirely sure. There were many things she had done that she was not certain of , the exact whys lost in the trance of the Skaikeyon.

But she was certain that she could rely upon Aelle.

After all, Aelle was only the first she would call to her. The first that had answered.


	11. Chapter 11

It was not hard to play the part of the loyal hound, Wanheda was known to possess a number of queer abilities surrounded by death at every turn. The gona shied away from them, various signs meant to ward away either evil or death displayed everywhere they walked. But none dared bar their way, the favored pet of Wanheda obedient at her side at each summit. Absently they gnawed at the bloody hunk of cow presented to them ears and nose scanning the halls as the visiting delegation mingling senselessly.

The posturing long and boring, the alliances were long set and their agenda clear to anyone who cared to pay attention.

Discretely their mistress passed along small portions of whatever passed the high table for inspection. A man’s senses could not detect the scent of treachery, poison was an inelegant tool that anyone could use without the slightest care for the art. That anyone could believe something as simple as poison could undo Wanheda was distantly amusing, unfortunately her chosen mate was not so resistant to death.

The legitimate heir of the Kongeda was a mighty warrior but Heda had yet to take the Mountain, the legitimacy of Heda’s reign had been in question until just recently. Arguably Heda’s only smart move was taking Wanheda for mate but even then, since the razing of the army, Wanheda had not performed another “miracle”.

There was a shift in the room.

Good, they had begun to take note of the missing man, Heda’s faithful servant and the pawn of yet another conspiracy. That Wanheda had once drunk poison and lived though her brave poisoner, the martyr, had fallen to convulsions only moments after the toast. That Wanheda had survived another assassination attempt was no surprise but the fleimkappa was not here, he who had facilitated attempt the fleimkappa’s head was mounted on a pike in the throne room.

Another face moved through the crowd, meticulously searching, seeking to uncover the whole of the conspiracy. Alysane Silvertongue was a useful asset, her genuine feelings of discontent with the Kongeda and open resistance to Heda at every turn made her an unlikely ally to Wanheda. All of Wanheda’s Forces had been chosen long before her departure from the reclusive Skaikru, her personal history unknown to even her chosen mate.

It was for the best, Wanheda would out live them all.

As the young woman draw closer they cracked one of the many bones in the nearly twenty pounds of meat they’d been provided between the thick bone crunching teeth far back in their jaws as loudly as possible. A deep rumbling growl of amusement echoed I the thick barrel of their chest rose as Heda flinched, her made did not. As Wanheda’s faithful hound it was their duty to inform her whenever a potential threat drew near, startling Heda was just a joy on top of the duty which they performed with a near religious vigor.

As a pale hand descended to scratch as the base of their ears, they whined in pleasure raising their head to chase her hand. “Where is Titos?” the hall went quiet even as Wanheda continued to stroke their head The man’s head was displayed to any and all who cared to browse the heads lined neatly up in the throne room but this coonformtation must happen for the sake of undoing the conspiracy. 

**Author's Note:**

> This story began as a fever dream... literally. I came up with this idea in the grip of the flu while binge watching Vikings on Hulu and if it goes anywhere cool. My love/hate relationship with A/B/O Dynamics has produced another crack child though not in the same vein as the other A/B/O story that I've written.
> 
> Oh! And if you haven't noticed this story does not happen in chronological order.


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